1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a device and method for pneumatically accelerating and decelerating an object, especially a participant on an amusement device commonly termed an amusement ride.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the sport of bungee jumping a participant usually ascends a tower, walks onto a bridge, is hoisted in a basket by a tower crane, or is lifted aloft in the gondola of a hot air balloon with a resilient band, i.e., a bungee cord, attached to the participant's body and to the tower, bridge, basket, or gondola. The participant then leaps from the tower, bridge, basket, or gondola and, because of the interactions between the force of gravity and the elastic force of the band, undergoes a series of basically vertical oscillations. Dampening produced by air friction and losses of energy within the band causes the oscillations to cease within a relatively short period of time. The participant is then lowered to the earth.
An initial device to capture the freedom and exhilaration of bungee jumping with increased safety and rapidity of repeating the experience is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,203,744 of Stanley J. Checketts. The device consists basically of a tower which participants may ascend by using a stairway or escalator, arms branching from the tower having open ends from which a participant attached to a resilient band may leap, and a winch to lower the participant to the earth after the oscillations induced by the initial leap have subsided and to restore the resilient band to its original location after it has been detached from the participant. The speed with which this experience may be repeated is, however, limited by two factors--the time it takes the participant to ascend the tower and the inability of each resilient band to handle more than one participant at a time.
Theoretically, more than one participant could simultaneously be elevated and then oscillated on the amusement device discussed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,221,215 of Lee U. Eyerly. But the practical capacity of Eyerly's car is severely limited by the fact that the springs or rubber bands essential to producing the oscillations are connected directly to a rigid member that pushes the bottom of the car and must, therefore, be vertically mounted. To generate sufficient force for vertically accelerating a platform capable of carrying more than a few participants requires large and, consequently, heavy springs or resilient bands. When installed vertically, their own weight impairs the resiliency of these springs or bands.
Another device which can produce vertical oscillations of multiple participants is the subject of U.S. Pat. No. 1,991,459, which was issued to Rudolf Heimers. Such device simply utilizes the muscular power of the participants to raise or lower a carrier that is suspended from a rope which winds around a flywheel that has an eccentrically arranged weight. The initial movement will cause the flywheel cyclically to wind and unwind the rope, thereby oscillating the participants. Since these oscillations are produced by the muscular power of the participants, the oscillations will require a rather lengthy period to reach reasonable amplitudes; and the attendant acceleration and deceleration will be rather limited in magnitude.
A final amusement device related to the present invention is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,701,528 of Jerry E. Ryan. This device consists of a vertical tower having eight outwardly extending horizontal arms. A participant can be suspended with a cable from a pulley attached to one of the horizontal arms. The participant is raised by filling a bucket attached to the other end of the cable with an adequate supply of water to act as a counterweight. Raising a removable weight from the bucket causes the participant slightly to outweigh the bucket of water then forming the counterweight so that the participant experiences a perceived reduced positive gravitational force. The device of U.S. Pat. No. 3,701,528 cannot, however, create a perceived negative (upward) gravitational force. Its operation, furthermore, requires a considerable period of time since each horizontal arm cannot simultaneously handle more than one participant and since the required movement of water will be quite consumptive of time.
All four of the preceding inventions are, moreover, limited to functioning in a basically vertical direction.
Additionally, no amusement device related to the present invention appears to be pneumatically operated. U.S. Pat. No. 3,587,397 of Berge Hagopian does, however, apply to a single pneumatic cylinder within which gas pressure applied to one face of a piston accelerates the piston for a portion of a stroke, whereupon the piston reaches an area in which a portion of the bore of the cylinder is enlarged to permit gas to pass around the piston to equalize the pressure on both sides of the piston. Momentum of the piston then carries it into a region where the bore has its original dimensions. Compression of the gas in front of the moving piston next decelerates the piston. Rebounding of the piston is prevented by allowing gas to pass, at a controlled rate, through an orifice leading from the substantially closed end of the cylinder toward which the piston has been accelerated.
No suggestion exists, though, that the device of U.S. Pat. No. 3,587,397 could be utilized in an amusement ride; and, as observed above, this device is designed to preclude the piston from rebounding.